


The Coffee Code

by impureimpulse, linefaced



Category: Persona 4
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-28
Updated: 2015-02-28
Packaged: 2018-03-15 14:33:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3450647
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impureimpulse/pseuds/impureimpulse, https://archiveofourown.org/users/linefaced/pseuds/linefaced
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yosuke's about to go on his first date with Souji to a coffee shop, but Rise and the girls know something he doesn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Coffee Code

**Author's Note:**

> This was an idea that ImpureImpulse and I have been kicking back and forth pretty much ever since we started in the Persona fandom. She came up with a lot of the basic ideas for it and I tried to polish them up into a story. Hopefully you'll find it as funny as we did.

Under other circumstances, Yosuke might have thought that ending up alone at the Junes food court with Rise Kujikawa, Yukiko Amagi, and Chie Satonaka would have been a pretty great situation. Three cute girls all to himself, because by some stroke of luck, Souji was busy doing whatever Soujis did on Saturdays after school, Teddie was off waving customers into the furniture section, and Kanji had somehow worked out how to string a sentence together in front of Naoto long enough to request her help in studying for an upcoming test. The problem was, this would have only been really lucky if _certain things_ were different about his life.

Like if he were actually single, for instance.

“So, are you nervous for your first date with Senpai?” Rise asked as she returned, carrying a soda she'd purchased from the machine near the yakisoba stand. Yosuke immediately turned a brilliant shade of vine-ripened tomato red, his voice cracking in indignance.

“Could you keep it down?!” he snapped, as she plopped down onto the bench across from him, her pigtails bouncing on her shoulders in a way that he might've found adorable if he weren't desperately trying to recover some amount of pride.

Chie kicked her feet back and forth, stuffing a bite of beef steak into her mouth and talking with her mouth full, something that Yosuke would have ordinarily snipped at her for, were his mind not occupied by everything else. “What's the big deal, Yosuke? I mean, it's not like it's some huge secret, here.”

“Yeah, but I'd prefer if we could make sure that the whole _town_ doesn't find out!” Yosuke bawled, sinking into his seat and wishing the ground would just swallow him up. It figured, somehow, that when he finally got to be alone with the girls without Mr. Handsome around to distract them, it was when he wouldn't be allowed to make a move on any of them. (Never mind the fact that none of those moves would ever be reciprocated, and really, if he was being _totally_ honest with himself—something he didn't make a habit of doing—he now knew enough about the inner workings of the trio he was sitting with to know that trying to date any of them would probably end in misery.)

Thinking about it that way, he supposed that was at least part of how he'd ended up with Souji.

“Where are you two going to go?” Yukiko asked, clearly both curious and trying to calm him with a more innocuous question. “Do you have any plans?”

“Dunno,” Yosuke muttered, still refusing to sit all the way up in his seat, as though he were sure that if any of the customers passing through the food court set their eyes on him, they'd just _know,_ somehow. “We're just gonna go to Okina and figure out what we wanna do from there, I guess.” He was practically sulking, and he knew it, but he didn't really try to stop, either.

“Are you gonna surprise him with a romantic dinner?” Chie piped up again, leaning across the table and grinning wide. “I bet he'd like that a lot. 'Oh, Yosuke, the candles reflect perfectly in your beautiful brown eyes...'”

Yosuke opened his mouth to chastise Chie for both the ridiculous suggestion _and_ her awful impression of Souji, but Rise spoke up before he could get a word in.

“Oh, oh, if you're going to Okina, you guys should totally get print club pictures together! That way you can be all couply without people staring, right? Just you and him, snuggled up in a photobooth together...” She beamed at him in a way that was either way too interested or way too teasing, and he couldn't tell which. Instead, he spluttered at the mental image, slamming one palm down on the table.

“Will you guys lay off?! It's a freakin' first date, not a marriage! We're just gonna start with coffee, and then maybe go to a movie or something! That's all!” Huffing, he folded his arms defensively over his chest and leaned back, glaring off to the side at nothing in particular. He was starting to regret the decision he and Souji had made to tell the others. Souji had reassured him that it would be for the best, especially because it likely wouldn't remain a secret for long, given how well the eight of them knew one another, but Yosuke had still needed to be dragged almost literally kicking and screaming to do it. It had gone better than Yosuke's doomsday expectations had predicted, though; for example, Kanji had only hit him _once_. He'd also apologized profusely right after and gone to get an ice pack for him.

Lost in his mental fog of anxiety and worry, Yosuke didn't notice the mischievious twinkle in Rise's eyes. (Then again, she had that so often that even if he hadn't been distracted by his fretting, he may still not have picked up on it.) She was quick to mask it, though, and instead pursed her lips in an expression of worry.

“Oh, _coffee?_ You should have said that sooner, Senpai,” she said, tapping her finely-manicured nails against the side of her soda can. Yosuke's rapt attention was on her in an instant.

“And _why_ do you sound so worried about that?!” he demanded, his voice cracking midway through the sentence. Rise just frowned, a response that made Yosuke's already-pounding heart leap up higher in his chest.

“Oh, well, you know,” she murmured vaguely, “it's just something I've heard once. I think I either read it in a magazine, or maybe someone backstage told me at a concert or something? Was it my makeup artist? I don't remember...”

“What. Is. _It?!_ ” Yosuke demanded, starting to feel more and more panicked as the furrow between Rise's eyebrows deepened.

“I dunno if I should tell you. I mean, Souji-senpai might not even know about it.”

Yosuke just stared at her, and eventually she continued, sounding hesitant.

“Well, apparently there's this... thing, among guys who, um, you know, like other guys?” she finally said, her lips pursing. “It's this code they do with coffee sometimes. There's something kinda like it overseas, or there used to be, with handkerchiefs?”

“What does the code signal?” Yukiko asked, always the diligent student, eager to learn new things. Rise pushed herself up in her seat, leaning in conspiratorily, and lowered her voice.

“It's supposed to signal what kind of sex you want,” she said, looking nervously over at Yosuke, concerned about his reaction. “With the handkerchief thing, I heard you were supposed to put different colors in your pockets. It's the same thing with the coffee. What kind of coffee you order tells your date what kind of sex you want to have with them.”

“Whoa, whoa, hold up, I've never heard of this!” Yosuke practically shouted, leaning back from the table. “There's no way, Partner's not really like that, and anyway, this is our first freakin' date!”

“You're probably right,” Rise agreed, but still looked doubtful. “But at the same time, who knows where Senpai used to hang out before he was here in Inaba? I mean, he's from the city, right? There's way more of that kind of thing out there. I should know.”

“Yes, but isn't Yosuke-kun from the city, too?” Yukiko asked. Yosuke puffed up and turned to her, and in the process failed to notice the fact that Chie was looking very intently at Rise, who was giving her a small smile back.

“Okay, yeah, I'm from the city, but why the _hell_ would I know about something like this?! I was a _normal_ guy with _normal_ friends and I hung out in _normal_ places!” Yosuke bawled, and Yukiko, unaffected by Yosuke's tantrum, frowned and looked back toward the other two girls.

“I don't suppose anyone else might have heard of this. Maybe Naoto-kun?” she suggested.

Chie spoke up next, though, which surprised Yosuke. “I doubt Naoto-kun would've heard of anything like that, remember how she was back at the club? But, y'know, the more Rise-chan talks about it, the more I think Souji-kun might actually know what she's talking about. I mean, he mentioned a while ago that he really wanted to take you out to coffee. Like, before you guys ever started going out, even.”

“He _what?!_ ” Yosuke squawked, oblivious to the stares he got for raising his voice. He could feel dread settling into his stomach along with the panic his brain was feeling, and his mind raced with the possibilties. What if Souji really _did_ know about this code?! But what was the point of taking him out for coffee if there was no way for Yosuke to know what the code even was? It wasn't like he just _hung out_ with guys who were like that!

But Souji _had_ quietly admitted to him when they'd gotten together that he pretty much exclusively liked boys, so there was a distinct possibility that he'd heard of this thing. Maybe he was trying to be subtle? Maybe he was trusting Yosuke to do his research on how guys date each other? Was this code a really popular thing that he'd find if he just searched around the internet a little? But they hadn't even discussed getting physical yet, they'd barely even kissed once, and it had been brief and kind of shy, and Yosuke hadn't even _tried_ to think about having sex with Souji, except maybe once when it had unwittingly flitted into his head while he was jerking off because he was a normal teenage boy with the normally high levels of hormones, and his brain had helpfully provided him with the realization that Souji's bangs would probably look _really good_ sticking to his forehead while he—

Okay, that was enough of that. He felt like his brain might break at any second.

“What's the code?!” he demanded of Rise, so suddenly and so aggressively that she nearly dropped her soda, but she set it down on the table and tapped her finger against her chin.

“Um, I hope I remember it right. It's been a while since I heard about it, so I could be wrong—”

“Just _tell me!_ ” Yosuke wailed, and Rise waved her hands to try and calm him.

“Okay, okay, just chill out, Yosuke-senpai!” she leaned in and lowered her tone again, and the other three at the table leaned in with her. “I remember adding peppermint to anything meant you really liked blowjobs. Putting it in hot coffee means you like getting them, putting it in iced coffee means you like giving them.”

“Why peppermint?” Yosuke asked, his voice cracking halfway through the question.

“You know, because there's that trick where you eat a mint and then go down on someone?”

“What trick?” Yukiko asked, intrigued, but Chie nudged her in the ribs with an elbow.

“Later, Yukiko,” she said, and Yukiko looked a bit disappointed, but nodded for Rise to continue.

“What else, hm... Oh, whipped cream on top means you like to get, uh, well. You know. On your face?” Rise said, blushing a little and fidgeting in her seat. Yosuke recoiled in horror, but managed to swallow his outburst this time, since he was seriously worried about eavesdropping customers.

“O-Okay, what else?” he asked, trying not to look as deeply panicked as he felt. So far this was all really common stuff to get added to coffee, and he'd had no idea. What if he'd been secretly signaling people around him this whole time? How many people knew about this, anyway?!

“Um...” Rise frowned at the tabletop, and Yosuke managed to miss that she was trying to make something else up, believing her hesitation to just be an attempt to remember something she'd only heard in passing. Chie prompted her.

“What about, like, uh, I dunno, chocolate? Like, what's a mocha mean?” she asked, and despite the fact that she was usually a bad actor, she managed to sound legitimately curious.

“Oh! Chocolate is bondage,” Rise confirmed immediately, struck by inspiration. “Hazelnut is, uh, toys, I think? And vanilla is backwards from what you might think, it means you like all kinds of weird things. Putting cinammon in stuff means you like it in public, you know, like... to keep things spicy?” She knew it was a lame connection to make, but Yosuke was so busy freaking out that he didn't notice at all.

He was almost afraid to ask, but he needed to know what his normal order meant, and what he might have accidentally signaled to Souji if he hadn't known about this.

“What... what if you add orange to something?” he asked, nervously, and Chie piped up again.

“Oh, that's what you usually get, right?” she said, and bumped her knee into Rise's, who immediately looked more worried than she had for the entire conversation.

With a purposeful slowness, avoidance of eye contact, and an uncomfortable squrm in her seat, she murmured, “Oh, orange...? That's not good... _really_ not good...”

“What?!” Yosuke asked, desperately, about to reach across the table and shake her. “What does orange mean?!”

“I... I can't tell you, sorry!” Rise cried, jumping up from her chair and looking just short of terrified. “Anyway, Yosuke-senpai, it was nice hanging out with you goodluckonyourdate!” With that, she bolted across the food court toward the elevators before anyone could stop her. Chie jumped up, grabbing Yukiko's arm.

“Let's go make sure she's okay, Yukiko. Bye Yosuke!” she said, and stood up. Yukiko mumbled something about how she “really wanted to know, too”, then bowed her head to Yosuke as she let herself be dragged off toward the elevators. Yosuke sat there in a stunned silence, with more questions than he'd started with, and a deep-set fear of his date with Souji the next day.

* * *

Yosuke ended up not being able to sleep for most of the night, and showed up at the coffee shop with bags under his eyes that looked and felt heavier than his school bag. Souji, ever timely Souji, was waiting for him out front, and gave him a concerned once-over.

“Are you all right, Yosuke?” he asked gently. Yosuke was still pretty sure that Souji could just ask nicely and he could get anyone to tell him anything. Or maybe go out to on a date with him. The memory of what they were here for and the talk he'd had with the girls the previous day sent a fresh jolt of worry and fear through him, and he covered for it in his usual way: loudly, obviously, and with no grace at all.

“Yeah, I'm fine, Partner! Why wouldn't I be? I mean, I just didn't sleep too well last night, but I was probably just... just nervous, yeah! I know it's just coffee, but still, it's been a while since I've—”

“Yosuke.”

The sound of his name stopped him in his tracks, and Yosuke's jaw snapped shut mid-sentence, nearly against his will.

Souji had two voices, according to the team: there was Leader Voice, which was what he used while they were in the TV World to bark orders and keep them all safe. Then there was this one, a voice that Souji used when he wanted something he felt like he couldn't ask for. It wasn't a voice he used very often anymore; mostly they'd gotten used to listening for it earlier on, while the team was still new and getting used to each other. Yosuke hadn't ever gotten much out of Souji about his parents, only vague allusions to the fact that they weren't around a lot, and it was easy to figure out Souji was accustomed to being independent, and it affected the way he behaved around people. For a while, it had been hard to get him to even ask someone to bring him back a soda from the machine if they were headed there already, and so the seven of them had trained themselves to stop talking and listen whenever Souji used this particular tone of voice. Yosuke almost missed it, he'd been so busy trying to talk through his nervousness that he'd nearly charged right over him, but one look at Souji's face made him glad he hadn't.

“Look,” Souji continued, his expression cloudy and withdrawn, like it was still his first few weeks in Inaba, “if you don't want to do this, that's all you have to say. You don't need to force yourself.”

Yosuke's heart dropped like a rock into his stomach, and he quickly raised his hands, waving them frantically. His fear of upsetting Souji far overtook his fear of a coffee date, and he took a quick lok around to make sure no one was paying immediate attention to them, then stepped closer and surreptiously grasped Souji's hand in one of his, desperation temporarily overtaking his sense of shame.

“That's not...” he began, fumbling for the right words, “that's not the problem. There is no problem. I'm just... not used to this, okay? It's not you, it's me, I promise. I'll be fine.” The last part was a tremendous lie, he was still a ball of nerves, but if there was any time to cover that up, it was now. So Yosuke forced himself to mean it, just long enough to console Souji and get that little furrow between his barely-visible eyebrows to disappear. He could practically see the wheels turning in Souji's head, but eventually Souji sighed and nodded.

“Okay. If you say so. Should we go inside?” he gave Yosuke's hand a squeeze (a motion that set off a different kind of weird little flutters in Yosuke's chest) and then pulled away to open the door to the shop. Yosuke followed him inside, and they stood a few feet away from the counter, looking up at the menu.

“Know what you want?” Souji asked, glancing over at him out of the corner of his eye. “I'll pay.”

Normally, Yosuke would have made some quip about how he didn't _need_ Souji to pay for him and did that mean that Souji thought of him as the girl in this relationship, but the weight of the decision he was about to make hit him like a freight train, and he flapped his mouth soundlessly for a few seconds as he tried to come up with a response.

“Um, I'm still deciding!” he said, just a little too quickly, but Souji didn't seem to take much notice.

“Sure, take your time.”

Yosuke stared at the menu, going through each thing and trying to figure out what was safe. He found himself almost wishing he'd written down everything Rise had said, because he couldn't remember what in the world “toffee nut” could mean to gay dudes, but it was probably nothing he wanted to do, ever. What about seasonal flavors? What about combinations of things that would directly conflict with one another? Had she even ever explained what just plain coffee meant?

With that thought, inspiration struck him. She hadn't ever said anything about what just plain, black coffee with no additives would mean. It _had_ to be just plain old sex, right? Or something really boring and basic. Yosuke had already had _that_ particular freakout, the one in which he had to come to terms with the fact that being with Souji probably meant that at some point he probably wanted to try having sex with Souji, and he'd stopped denying the fact that getting Souji horny, messy, and sweaty was something that had made it onto his to-do list. So, signaling that plain old sex of some kind or another was something he (eventually) wanted to try would just be being honest, and he could make it out of this fiasco comparatively unscathed.

“I think I'll just get a plain, black coffee.” Yosuke murmured thoughtfully, and Souji immediately threw a wrench into his plans by giving him a strange look.

“But, Yosuke,” he said, “you hate black coffee.”

_Shit._

In the middle of all his overthinking about this, he hadn't stopped to consider the fact that he couldn't _drink_ black coffee, because the bitterness was too overpowering. Dojima had offered him a mug of it once when he, Chie, and Yukiko had been over to study with Souji, and after Yosuke had taken a sip and nearly spit it out, Chie had made some quip about how it was funny that Yosuke couldn't handle it, given how bitter he was as a person. Then an argument had ensued, and it'd taken Nanako telling them off to get them to stop.

Either way, he couldn't do this. He couldn't drink it as it was, and who knew what adding plain sugar and milk to coffee meant?! If vanilla, the most basic of flavorings, meant being into the worst things, Yosuke couldn't even wrap his head around what sugar and cream meant. Did nonfat milk mean something different than two percent? What about whole milk? Which was worse?!

“Yosuke?” Souji prompted again, interrupting his mental breakdown and peering into his face. “Are you sure you're all right? We can just call this off, if you want...”

“No!” Yosuke snapped forcefully. He had to figure something out. He had to say something. He both couldn't screw this up for Souji _and_ couldn't signal that he was into weird, kinky gay sex with the kind of drink he was getting. But the latter was proving the be harder than the former, and in his sleepless exhaustion Yosuke could feel his capacity for worry rapidly diminishing and pure tiredness taking over. It was too much trouble to keep freaking out about this, plus worrying Souji was only making the whole thing worse. Maybe he could just feign ignorance. He hadn't known about the code, and therefore he couldn't be held accountable for accidentally signalling that he was into being spanked with a slice of melon while licking someone's shoe.

Or something.

How was he supposed know what guys like that were into?!

Yosuke hoped that Souji would have no choice but to just believe him, and wouldn't just pressure him into trying whatever it was he'd accidentally indicated got him off.

“Just... order for me?” Yosuke asked pleadingly. “I'm really tired, and I can't think straight.”

Souji gave him a long, doubtful stare, but couldn't read what Yosuke's problem was just from his expression, so he shrugged and moved up to the counter while Yosuke slunk off to a corner booth with high seat backs to sit and wait for his fate to be revealed.

 _At least,_ he thought, _this might give some indication of whether or not this whole dating-your-best-friend thing was going to work out._ If Souji was into the _really_ freaky stuff, Yosuke wasn't sure if a relationship was for them, anyway. (He'd said he'd still be his _friend_ if he was, after all, not that he'd _date_ him.) But the thought of breaking up with Souji before even completing one damn date only made him more stressed about the whole thing, and eventually he flopped onto the table with a miserable resignation. Maybe he could just suck it up and go through with... whatever it was. It wasn't likely to kill him, right? Souji probably wasn't into doing weird stuff in public, so it'd be something for behind closed doors, where no one else had to know about it. Unless Souji got off on telling people about it. How would Yosuke know, and what kind of coffee would _that_ be?

It took several minutes before Souji appeared again at the table, setting a large, blended, floofy-looking drink in front of his partner. Yosuke stared at it, and Souji laughed quietly, taking his surprise for something different.

“I wasn't sure what you'd like,” he admitted, sheepishly, “so it's got a lot of stuff in it. I remembered you liked orange, but I wasn't sure what else. So I had them add some vanilla, and a little bit of caramel. And some whipped cream on top. Hopefully that's acceptable?”

Yosuke stared at the drink, unsure of how to respond as he scrambled to try and remember what or if Rise had told him caramel was. Orange was apparently something unspeakable, and vanilla was bad. And whipped cream was...

“Wh-What'd you get in yours?” Yosuke asked, trying to keep his voice from cracking. Souji sat down opposite him and peered at his own drink.

“Well, I didn't want to make you feel bad by not getting something equally sugary, so I got mint and chocolate. And whipped cream, of course.” Souji held up his cup, smiling as he took a sip. Yosuke watched the straw on his lips, feeling a whole new set of problems starting to arise. He got them both whipped cream? What the hell was _that?!_ Chocolate meant bondage, Rise had said, and so did that mean... Yosuke was in _no way_ experienced with tying people up, that was _way_ too high of an expectation to have for a first date. It was totally unfair. He had to put a stop to this.

Yosuke hesitated, his gaze slipping back to his drink as he puzzled over how to bring this up. Souji, noticing his uncharacteristic silence, looked at him questioningly, and after another moment his face fell ever-so-slightly.

“Yosuke, I really did mean it. If you don't want to do this...” he began, but Yosuke interrupted.

“I didn't know about the code!” he blurted without thinking. “I swear, I didn't, Rise just told me about it the other day, and to be honest, Partner, it's _really_ _freaking me out!_ ”

“Whoa, whoa,” Souji said, looking surprised and holding up his hands in a calming motion, “slow down. What's this about a code? What code?”

Yosuke gaped at him, his mouth slightly open. Did he really not know, or was he just pretending because they were in public? Souji gave him no signal that he was hiding anything, though, and as he stared into his partner's uncomprehending face, Yosuke was suddenly hit with a terrible, soul-wrenching realization, that instantly became less of a possibility and more of a reality.

_The girls had totally been fucking with him._

“God... damn it...” Yosuke muttered, putting his face in his hands. “I can't believe I fell for that bullshit...”

“What?” Souji asked, looking increasingly worried. “What in the world is going on, Yosuke? What happened?” He reached across the table, grasping Yosuke's wrist and tugging on it a little, trying to peer into his face. Yosuke groaned, now almost _more_ mortified by the fact that he'd have to explain this to Souji than he'd been by the whole idea of the code in the first place.

“The girls pranked me,” he said miserably, allowing Souji to pull his hands away from his face but flopping dramatically down onto the table instead, “by telling me that there was some weird... gay code, that gay guys use at coffee places. They told me you probably knew about it.”

Souji continued to look baffled, so Yosuke sighed heavily and went on, “Rise started it. She said that gay guys would figure out what kind of... stuff... you liked to do in bed, by what you got in your coffee. She said you'd probably know about it because you lived in the city, and like, you never talk about who you used to hang out with, so she totally had me hook, line, and sinker.”

Souji's surprise slowly faded from his face, and made a thoughtful humming noise as he mulled over the new information. Yosuke felt a sudden, irrational surge of annoyance, and clenched his fist, lightly smacking the table and jolting Souji out of his thoughts.

“Look, can we just skip to the part where you laugh at me for being a gullible moron and dump me, already?” he asked, already in full, self-pity spiral mode. Souji paused, then put his own head down on the table so he was eye-level with Yosuke.

“You really think I'd dump you over that?” he asked, softly. Yosuke looked away, knowing what the answer was, but stubbornly clinging to his humiliation.

“Who knows? You're a smart guy, you probably wanna date smart people. Not guys who think that there's some kinda gay code for coffee.”

“Yosuke,” Souji said, a little more firmly this time, reaching across the table and gently running his fingers through Yosuke's hair, “you're not an idiot. You're right, I've never talked about who I hung out with, and you've never hung out with a bunch of guys who were like that, either, right? So you wouldn't know any better. And I _did_ invite you out for coffee, first thing.”

Yosuke said nothing, but was starting to finally allow himself some hope. Souji didn't sound mad, or annoyed, or even a little exasperated. He sounded like he understood. Which was typical, and Yosuke felt stupid for having expected anything else. Souji always understood, after all.

“...I guess,” he relented, and Souji smiled warmly at him, in that way that made Yosuke's chest feel funny and his heart beat a little faster.

“See? It's fine. But no, I'm not indicating anything with what I brought you, I just thought you might like it.” Souji picked up Yosuke's drink and took a sip. “And it's pretty good, if I do say so myself.”

“You say that like _you_ made it,” Yosuke grumbled, but when Souji held his drink out to him, he leaned in and took a sip himself. “You're right, though. It's good.”

“See?” Souji smiled again. “Also, you just indirectly kissed me, but that's beside the point.”

Yosuke spluttered, and Souji laughed, but not at all mockingly. His laugh was like his smile—rare, but bright and warm, and something about it turned Yosuke's insides into mush.

Souji made another humming noise after he'd calmed down again, resting his cheek on his hand. “Can I ask you something, though?”

“Yeah?”

“What _was_ the code, anyway? Like, what would my drink mean?”

Yosuke hesitated, but Souji seemed to just be geniuinely curious, and so he lowered his voice before he answered so he wouldn't be overheard. “Uh, she said chocolate meant you were into bondage, mint in a cold drink meant you, um, wanted to, you know...” He could feel his face heating up, but Souji's face was mostly neutral. Still interested, but not in any kind of weird way, and that put Yosuke at ease.

“It meant you wanted to go down on someone,” he said, quickly. Souji blinked, but otherwise didn't react much.

There were a few seconds of blessed silence as Yosuke tried to quell his embarrassment. Souji, however, continued to look thoughtful, taking a sip of his drink before he met Yosuke's eyes again, and asked, abruptly and with no change of expression, “Would you want me to?”

Nearly spitting out the mouthful he had, Yosuke choked. His eyes went wide, and he made some kind of noise, but it was mostly a “Whagah?!” or something equally coherent. Souji still didn't look particularly ruffled, taking another long drink before he shrugged.

“I guess it's too early to talk about things like that, though, you're right,” he mused, glancing idly around the shop instead. Yosuke took a few seconds to recover long enough to be able to form full words.

“Have... Have you even done that before?!” he managed to ask, his voice cracking like he was going through puberty all over again. Souji shrugged again.

“I tried, once. I wasn't very good. I'd try harder with you,” he replied, the epitome of nonchalance. Without skipping a beat, he continued, “What was whipped cream, then?”

Yosuke's brain wasn't feeling fully equipped to even _begin_ parsing his first statement, and quickly latched onto the change of subject so he wouldn't have to try and imagine Souji Seta going down on him anymore. He was so relieved for the topic switch that he said, with much less embarrassment, “It meant you wanted someone to jizz on your face.”

Souji said nothing, looking down at the top of his drink. He glanced over at Yosuke, who flinched, and then reached over and scooped up a small bit of cream from Yosuke's coffee onto the tip of his finger, then wiped it on his own cheek. Yosuke stared.

“Hm...” Souji mused, “Nope, I don't think this is for me.” He laughed then, reaching for a napkin and wiping his face off. Before Yosuke could stop him, he'd picked up cream on his finger again—this time from his own drink—and reached across the table to smear it on Yosuke's nose.

“What about you?” he asked, barely able to contain his laughter. Yosuke couldn't help but smile himself, and imitated Souji's thinking pose, then laughed aloud.

“No, I don't think I'm into it, Partner. Sorry to disappoint.”

“Oh well,” Souji said, leaning back into his chair and taking another sip of his coffee, “I guess we'll just have to forget that, then.”

Continuing to smirk mischieviously, he glanced around the coffee shop again to make sure no one was looking their way, and leaned forward, swiping the cream he'd put on Yosuke's nose back onto a finger, and then licking it off. Yosuke tried not to watch the way his tongue slid delicately across his fingertip, and fidgeted in his seat. Lucky for him, Souji unwittingly saved him from heading down another awkward thought process by speaking up again.

“So, what kind of coffee signals that I'd like to go see a movie with you?” he asked, sitting back down in his seat, and taking a very self-satisfied drink from his straw. Yosuke, forgetting his earlier awkwardness, smiled again.

“I don't remember exactly what Rise said, but I think it might be exactly what you got, Partner.”

“Oh, I see. Then what's yours mean?” Souji asked, beginning to stand up. Yosuke did the same, picking up his drink and peering at it closely, like it was some kind of crystal ball.

“Hm, I think vanilla means a second date is in order,” he said. “And the orange means it has to be one where I _don't_ embarrass the hell out of myself this time.”

Grinning at Souji, he looped an arm over his partner's shoulders, and they headed out the door together.


End file.
